St. Martinville, La. — When Dr. Jackie Simon was asked to perform surgery on a microchipped spay with vaginal prolapse due to hyperplasia, she faced a tough
decision: wait to get permission from the person who registered the
chip or fulfill the new owner’s request to do the procedure.

In
the end, Simon went ahead with the repair and put herself on the line
for the dog’s health, despite her lawyer's warning of possible legal
ramifications. She also talked her client into contacting the microchip
registrant, who could not be reached after multiple attempts to make a connection.

Once rare, scenarios like this now appear more commonplace, and they don’t always
have happy endings. Recently, an associate lost her job after
contacting a microchip registrant despite a client’s pleas to ignore
the information and the practice owner’s decision to honor the new
owner’s wishes. The act, which eventually solved an ownership dispute, raises the
following question: Do veterinarians have a legal or ethical duty to
scan for microchips and contact owners of record, and if so, what is
their obligation to the client presenting the animal?

“There’s
a very big gray zone when it comes to microchips and the responsibility
of veterinarians dealing with them,” Simon says. “It would be nice to
have some guidelines because, oftentimes, there’s no way for a
veterinarian to win in situations like this.

“Most veterinarians
wouldn’t hesitate to track a rabies tag down,” she adds. “What’s the
difference between that and a microchip?”

Recently, an American
Veterinary Medical Association’s (AVMA) task force attempted to answer such
questions with revisions to the group’s microchip policy, passed by the
Executive Board in November. Among the modifications, the policy now advises veterinarians to ID
patients prior to performing medical or surgical treatment and
encourages practitioners to scan every animal presented.

As
for ownership disputes, AVMA policy shies away from establishing an
absolute duty to get involved by leaving it up to a DVM’s “professional
judgment.” Still, it advises practitioners to ask for ownership
documentation in suspicious cases and to require it before removing a
microchip.

“We don’t want to make veterinarians cops, but if
there are red flags, a vet should ask for proof of ownership,” says
Adrian Hochstadt, JD, CAE, assistant director for AVMA’s State
Legislative and Regulatory Affairs. “We’ve been getting a lot of
inquiries about the various ethical issues pertaining to microchips,
and there’s very little in terms of statutory or regulatory guidelines.
This is an issue that can get really dicey. We want to be careful not
to make legal duties too much of a burden on members.”

According
to some veterinarians, various chip manufacturers already tout such
obligations, advising that it’s “highly illegal” for a DVM to
intentionally fail to report a microchipped pet and contact the owner
of record. While AVID and 24PetWatch did not respond to VIN New Service
interview requests, Schering-Plough Animal Health issued the following
statement concerning its HomeAgain Microchip Identification System:

“We
recommend vets consult the AVMA, (American Animal Hospital
Association), other trade association of their choice, or their
attorneys for guidance on this issue.”

Greg Dennis, legal
counsel to the Kansas Veterinary Medical Association, backs that
suggestion, yet he acknowledges that there’s little legal or regulatory
precedence outlining a veterinarian’s obligation to scan and report
patients. While researching the topic for a talk during last summer’s
AVMA convention, Dennis discovered that the only regulatory action
involving microchips stemmed from a case in Great Britain, where a
veterinarian was disciplined for failing to scan for a microchip among
other infractions.

Whether or not reporting a microchipped pet
breaches veterinary-client privilege laws or there’s an ethical
obligation to contact former owners hasn’t been spelled out yet, even
within AVMA's revised policy, he says. The same goes for the argument
that there’s a stolen property element to many of these cases.

“You
can sit here and contemplate that the veterinarian is in possession of
stolen property, but once again, you don’t know if the animal been
stolen,” Dennis says. “This gets complicated in the law because people
do abandon animals with microchips.”

VIN News Service commentaries are opinion pieces presenting insights, personal experiences and/or perspectives on topical issues by members of the veterinary community. To submit a commentary for consideration, email news@vin.com.